Femi Adeshina, Special adviser, media and Publicity, to the President of Nigeria has explained that bandits cannot be called Terrorists because they are just mere criminals.
According him Bandits are just Criminals and cannot be compared to Boko Haram whose taking over territories.
He said Bandits just want to steal Robb and rape but Boko Haram wants to take over Nigeria and become leader of the nation.
Adeshina said this In an interview with Vanguard newspaper recently.
He said:
“For me personally, mark my words, personally, it is a matter of semantics. Semantics is a theory of meaning in language. So, whether they are called terrorists or they’re called bandits, it is just semantics. A criminal is criminal. They either repent, change their ways or you eliminate them. That’s what matters,” the presidential aide said.
“Who are terrorist? Terrorists more often than not levy war against a nation and they seek to seize territories and occupy them. That is a terrorist and that is why Boko Haram are terrorists, because at the time before this administration came, they were occupying a minimum of 17 local governments in this country and they wanted more. They wanted to take over the entire country and create a caliphate. They are terrorists.
“These ones, bandits, they have no ideology. No ideology. They are just interested in criminality for the sake of criminality. Robbing, raping, maiming, stealing, no ideology. Have you heard that they seized territory? They are not interested.
“So, but like I said, criminality is criminality. Eliminate all of them and that is what our security forces are doing,”
